The Review

Alley Kat has been taking up a lot of room in the Local Heroes guide of late, so it’s nice of them to have released a gluten-reduced offering, which they say has been tested at less than 20 PPM, but that the test can’t take detect any post-fermentation gluten proteins. So, caveat emptor, then. On the marketing side, the Scona Gold name has been brought back from the dead, now in the form of a Kölsch. The sad part, is that this is a sort of replacement for the recently departed Charlie Flint Lager from their regular lineup.

It smells of semi-sweet bready pale malt, fruity white wine spritzer, and tame earthy, floral hops. The taste is more sweet, almost rising pastry-like bready malt, the yeast tripping off that particular synapse, pear, white table grape, and peach-dominated fruit cocktail syrup, and leafy, ethereally floral hops. The carbonation is quite low-key, and barely supportive in its frothy temerity, the body a healthy medium-light weight, and simple in its fruity smoothness, with a touch of airy creaminess. It finishes well off-dry, the bready, almost sugary pale malt still engaged in a nice two-step with the bilaterally sourced fruitiness.

A pleasant and agreeable, gently rendered Kölsch, the fruitiness, and low hop bitterness doing well to play up to style. Another nail in the coffin of gluten free/reduced beers made with alternative grains, as opposed to the enzyme-based method of extracting gluten from a normal barley malt brew, the latter of which appears well-capable of producing tasty, enjoyable results.